The state of Florida executed 58-year-old Mark Allen Geralds at 6:15 p.m. on Tuesday at Florida State Prison, according to the Florida Department of Corrections. He was convicted of the 1989 murder of a Bay County mother.
His last words were “I’m sorry that I missed you [unintelligible]. I love you everyday,” according to witness and journalist John Koch.
Geralds was convicted of first-degree murder, armed robbery, burglary and grand theft auto in 1990. Shortly after his death warrant was signed, he waived his right to make any further appeals in court.
He is the 18th person executed in Florida this year, the most by the state in any single year.
The crime
On the morning of Feb. 1, 1989, Geralds broke into 33-year-old Tressa Lynn Pettibone’s house where she lived with her husband and two children, according to court documents.
“Tressa’s family was her world, and everything she did centered around them,” the Pettibone family wrote in a statement read after Gerlads’ execution.
She started dating her husband in the 8th grade and married him when she was 19 years old.
Geralds was a carpenter who had previously done work on the Pettibone house.
A week prior to Pettibone’s death, Geralds had run into the family at a shopping mall and Pettibone mentioned her husband was out of town. Later that day, he went up to Pettibone’s son, Bart, in an arcade to ask him when he and his sister got home from school and when their father would be back, the court documents noted.
When Pettibone’s 8-year-old son came home from school on Feb. 1, he found his mother stabbed to death on the kitchen floor.
A statement read at a press conference following the execution said the experience left a lasting impact on Bart.
“He often described it as though someone took a sledgehammer to his head that awful day,” the statement said.
Pettibone had been beaten repeatedly before being fatally stabbed with a kitchen knife. A medical examiner determined her wrists had been bound with plastic ties, according to the court documents.
Similar plastic ties to the ones used on Pettibone were found in Geralds’ car, court documents noted.
Several jewelry items had been taken from the home in addition to the mother’s car, which was later found in the parking lot of a nearby school, according to court records.
Later that afternoon, Geralds pawned a necklace matching the description of the one missing from the Pettibone house, with a blood stain on it that didn’t match Geralds’ blood type, according to court records.
Geralds later argued it was not Pettibone’s necklace. However, Pettibone’s daughter said the necklace was her mother’s, according to the court documents.
A woman also told police that Geralds had given her a pair of sunglasses around that time, which Pettibone’s daughter described as just like the ones missing from her home.
The punishment
Geralds was found guilty of the murder in February 1990, and eight of 12 jurors recommended a death sentence.
The jury found four aggravating factors and no mitigating circumstances.
The Florida Supreme Court affirmed the conviction but overturned the death sentence due to the prosecution improperly mentioning Geralds’ past non-violent felony convictions during trial, according to court records.
Geralds was granted a new sentencing hearing in 1993, during which a different jury unanimously recommended a death sentence.
The judge agreed with the jury after weighing the aggravating factors and newly found mitigating circumstances, including a diagnosis of antisocial personality disorder, according to the court documents. The judge sentenced Geralds to death on April 13, 1993.
The Florida Court affirmed this sentence three years later.
Several post-conviction appeals consisting of claims of ineffective counsel and trial errors followed, court records show.
The Florida Supreme Court denied all of Gerald’s appeals on Jan. 18, 2006, leading him to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, where he was denied for the final time in 2021.
Gov. Ron DeSantis signed Geralds’ death warrant on Nov. 7. A few days later, Geralds filed a motion to waive his right to any further appeals. It was accepted by the court, and he no longer fought to stop his execution in the courts.
The day of the execution
The Our Lady of Lourdes church congregation travels by bus from Daytona Beach to the state prison to protest every execution.
Today was no different, but with them stood two other organizations fighting against the death penalty.
Death Penalty Action and Journey of Hope – From Violence to Healing are traveling the country together to raise awareness about the death penalty and “to give people who want to the oppose the death penalty the tools with which to do so more impactfully,” said Abraham Bonowitz, the executive director of Death Penalty Action.
With them travels a bell that originally stood in Delaware and was rung every time a prisoner was executed. Bonowitz has carried it around the country wherever there is an execution happening.
Every Florida execution, around 6 p.m., protesters hit a cylinder gong belonging to Our Lady of Lourdes, which is plastered with anti-death penalty messages. Today, the bronze bell from Delaware sat next to it.
Protesters lined up to hit the bells, the cylinder gong and then the bronze bell, so one would sound after the other. They hoped it would be heard from inside the prison, so the person being executed knew there were people outside praying for him.
“We’re just making sure that people can hear our voices,” Bonowitz said.
He travels with SueZann Bosler, one of the founders of Journey of Hope and a victim of violence.
In 1986, Bosler watched a man stab her father to death in his house before he stabbed her. She survived, and he didn’t. But she forgives the man responsible and even fought for him not to receive the death penalty.
Before the murder, her dad had told her he didn’t believe in the death penalty. So, Bosler started her campaign against the death penalty for him. Now, she truly believes the message and will continue with this work until she dies, she said.
“Why kill people, or execute people, who kill people to show us Floridians that killing people is wrong?” Bosler said.
She holds a card in her wallet, at all times, that says if she is ever killed, she does not want the person responsible to get the death penalty.
Bill Campbell, from Marion County, has different thoughts on the subject. He comes out to the lawn across from the state prison for every execution in support.
He holds a sign with the words “Bye, Bye” written on it and the names of the last dozen or so people executed. He crosses out each name once they are executed and writes the next person below it.
He also plays music that can be heard on the other side of the lawn where the protesters sit.
“I want them to stop coming,” he said. “I don’t understand why they’re against [the death penalty].”
Campbell said he will continue coming to counter the protesters until they stop showing up.
At a press conference following the execution, a state attorney read a statement on behalf of the victim’s family.
“[Pettibone] was so full of life, and she often talked about her favorite memories and her excitement for the good things still to come,” the statement said. “Unfortunately, Mark Geralds took her life in a senseless, violent act that forever changed the course of our lives.”
The family said, in the statement, they think the execution will provide them with the peace they have been seeking and they hope, in the future, it does not take so long for justice to be carried out.
Contact Alexa Ryan at aryan@alligator.org. Follow her on X @AlexaRyan_.
Alexa is a second-year journalism and international studies students serving as the Fall 2025 Criminal Justice beat reporter. She previously served as a copy editor. She spends her free time running, traveling, having movie nights and going on random side quests with friends.
